Overmars

I have seen FM streamers championing the idea that you can load a handful of leagues and 100k+ players with full expectations of a realistic game world. I dsagree with this notion because: I want my AI team opponents to participate in the transfer market without me pushing them to do so. I want my AI team opponents to be as competitive as possible for my international club competitions (ex. Champions League). I want statistics in other leagues to be comparable for scouting and curiosity purposes. The game world feels more realistic when you can see fixtures, promotions, relegations, etc. in my opinion, AI teams are virtually useless and their players exist in a hidden alternate universe if their league isn't playable. For my European saves (usually with a club from one of the top 7 nations), I use the following setup, which ends up loading approximately 100k players: Playable Leagues: England x 4 France x 2 Germany x 2 Italy x 2 Spain x 2 Netherlands Portugal Belgium Switzerland Austria Greece Scotland Ukraine Turkey Croatia Serbia Czechia Denmark Norway Sweden Poland View-Only Leagues: South America Rest of Europe Any other league I maintain a tiny bit of curiosity about (ex. Mexico, USA, South Korea, Russia) Additional Players from all Continents: Current International players Continental reputation players National reputation players Players from top clubs (optional - adds another ~20k players depending on other settings) Additional Players from my Chosen Nation: Players of that nationality Additional Players from Other Nations (optional): if I was managing in Portugal, I would load players from the top 3 leagues in Brazil and all players from other Portuguese-speaking nations of Angola, Mozambique, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Timor-Leste, Macau, and Sao Tome & Principe. Full-Sim Detail: World Cup Euro World Cup & Euro Qualifiers (optional) Other big continental competitions (optional) All leagues and the biggest cup competition from my chosen nation Top league from each of England, Germany, Italy, Spain, and France Champions League Europa League I have a new-ish computer that makes the full-sim detail option worth it. My processing times only really slow down on transfer deadline day. The first thing to go if I needed more speed would be some of the full-sim detail options of leagues outside of my nation. If I still needed more speed, I would remove some of the lower rep playable leagues (ex. Sweden and Poland).

Yes, but if you want to get through multiple seasons then offloading a lot of the day-to-day tasks to your backroom staff is the way to go. Training, scouting, and press conferences can all be offloaded. That would leave you managing matches, setting up tactics, and overseeing the transfer market. I would also recommend managing in a nation with short seasons (ex. Sweden).

Some ideas: Try 2 DM spots instead of CM. I find they position a lot better. A SV(a) with the right attributes (especially physical ones) will pop up in the box for 10+ goals a season. Pairing an A(d) with the SV provides nice balance and enables you to use an aggressive WB(a) or CWB(a) role on that same side. I would use an AP in the AMC spot if using a SV/A combo. Give your fullback(s) cross more and dribble more instructions if they are good at it. I've never had luck in FM23 with the winger role. IW and IF seem to deliver better results, even if playing on the same side as their preferred foot. I like to have the IF/IW players "sit narrow" to help get them into the attack. Offsetting the AMC and ST can help create more movement and uncertainty for your opposition.

I tried an asymmetric 4-2-3-1 (AMC on the left, ST on the right) in the pre-winter patch and it worked great -- although about the same as a conventional 4-2-3-1 or 4-3-3 had been working for me. I didn't view it as unfair to the AI. The formations I find unfair are formations with three central strikers, since no one really plays like that in real life and the match engine can't really cope with multiple AFs.

The improvement from pre-patch is appreciated, though. I just checked my pre-patch European save with 25+ leagues active and 8 of them on full sim. Man City has an average first team age of 32. Liverpool, Barcelona, and Chelsea have an average of 31. Seeing people's post-patch tests with these numbers in the high 20s is a good improvement, even if it isn't ideal. Improving loan behaviour was the right approach, but I think the game still slows down the speed of development too soon in a player's career. Shifting the aging curve even by just one year might fix everything. I wish this is something we could help SI test for FM24.

I am simming through the 2030 World Cup in my save, and the English national team has zero newgens in its starting lineup. Nine of these players are 30+ years old. England lost the quarterfinal on penalties, so the game does still feel real in that aspect. Alexander-Arnold was the sole penalty miss. Here are some other World Cup squads with zero newgens in their starting eleven: The Netherlands, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Denmark, Austria, Bosnia, and Poland. The only newgens playing in the tournament seem to be from nations whose leagues I have not loaded.

You don't need to turn on the leagues to buy players from those locations. I have never loaded any Colombian leagues, but I have been inundated with Colombian wonderkids in my current save. Serbians, Croatians, and Czechs can also be found for very little money, though the absolute game-changers will likely be from South America.

I can understand elite clubs favoring established veterans, but the biggest problem to me is that medium-sized clubs and feeder clubs keep favoring veterans too. A team such as Vitesse is playing in the Dutch Eredivisie and not competing for silverware, yet they don't bother developing young players in FM. In real life, Vitesse's average first team age is 23.6. In 2030 of my Dutch FM save, Vitesse is still in the Eredivisie and has just one first team player under 24. Their average first team age is closer to 28. There are plenty of other examples of these sorts of clubs sticking with veterans. So where are the breakthrough prospects? Vitesse has some of their own, but they are all vastly inferior to the veterans on their squad. Anyone decent is being bought by the big clubs who then destroy those kids' careers by: Not playing them Expecting silly monthly loan fees which stifles the loan market Maintaining a ridiculously high transfer fee expectation so no other team can buy and rescue the kids' careers Prospects are getting funneled too soon to teams they can't play for, and the loan market just isn't able to remedy the situation on a large enough scale. There are lots of young Dutch players with high potential, but most are rotting in the Ajax, PSV, and Feyenoord reserves instead of playing for smaller clubs such as Vitesse.

The match engine feeds chance after chance to advanced forwards latching on to the end of long balls. While common in real life, it does seem much more common in FM to have these sorts of chances, which is part of the reason why strikers score a higher proportion of total goals in FM than they do in real life. If you ask inside forwards to sit narrow then they too will experience some of the benefit of this match engine favoritism. Playing them wider or even using wider roles such as winger and inverted winger will yield fewer scoring chances for those players. They should still be able to contribute with plenty of dribbles and playmaking. A lot of their assists will be feeding the striker, which means that when AML/AMR players get big match ratings, they will amost invariably come with big ratings from the striker. Strikers, however, can score big ratings without AML/AMR involvement, so they tend to get higher ratings over the long run. But you can get an inside forward to score plenty of goals in FM. You just need to get a player who is miles ahead of his league peers, and he can dominate games. If your wide players are only league average then it becomes much harder to expect them to score. This is similar to real life where elite AML/AMR player such as Salah and Saka can score plenty of goals, while lower table clubs usually get very little from those spots. Another thing that can lead to better AML/AMR performances is to get taller players in those spots. They will win 6-10 headers per match, which is an odd FM quirk. You can also instruct them to tackle harder and press opponents, which will lead to a few clear cut chances from such pressing.

My best defensive season came with three CD(d) roles in my back 5. I messed around with the WCD role but didn't love the positioning. In all of my FM years, I never enjoyed a stopper/cover mix since theoretically I wouldn't want them mucking up an offside trap.

Start by dropping your defensive line. I am finding the "lower" or "much lower" defensive line instruction helps prevent some of the shockingly bad central defender behaviour in this match engine. You just can't afford to encourage your opponents to attempt direct passes over the top in FM23. Any team of reasonable quality will thread the needle a few times per match.

My preference would be to make the right back more defensive -- either a FB or IWB on support or defend duty. I would also consider using a defend duty for the left-sided DM. You can always adjust these as the game progresses if you need to take more risks. I really like having at least one of the DMs on defend duty or else they tend to push up too far in attack and expose your central defenders to many counterattacks. If you want to stick with two wingbacks and only one holding midfielder then you can just use a 4-3-3 which feels better-suited for that purpose.

In real life, top teams are averaging under 30 total headers per match. In my FM save, my games have anywhere from 60-120 headers per match. That's at least twice as many as real life. To me, that's a startling difference that is impossible to ignore. This is especially true when I have diminutive inverted wingers attempting 8-10 headers per match.

7-10 seasons for me. Occasionally I keep going, but I often find it becomes too easy to win and too far removed from the current football world. I will usually get sucked into starting a new save to try to win with clubs struggling in real life or just to use some of the real players in their prime years rather than a bunch of newgens.

Yes. I have a new computer with discrete graphics, but I still prefer playing in 2D. The game flickers and drops frames regularly. I have improved it somewhat by adjusting my monitor refresh rates to 60 Hz and limiting the FPS in the game to 60. After playing the game for extended periods, the flickering can return, but restarting the game fixes it.

Yes. Midfielders don't score enough, and strikers are scoring too often. I think this is down to there being too many one-on-ones and not enough scruffy goals. About half of goals should come from forwards, and in my games, that percentage is much higher.

Attacking mentality is not as "win now" as it has been in past FM versions. I actually think it's easier to find success with Balanced mentality, which is a big change for FM. Logically, Balanced will give you a chance to play without too much aggression, and if you need to push for a goal later in the match, you can raise the mentality to adopt more risk in your approach. For the 4-3-3, either the DM should have a defend duty or your fullbacks should be more conservative. The much higher defensive line, especially in combination with an Attacking mentality, is going to lead to plenty of balls over the top and through balls played against you. You will essentially be 2022-23 Liverpool, which isn't ideal. The higher tempo and hit early crosses instructions seem more suitable for the 4-4-2 formation than the 4-3-3, whereas the work ball into box instruction seems like a 4-3-3 type of instruction.

I suggest watching a match on full match highlights. You will probably see your IWBs moving to the middle on occasion but often remaining out wide. They behave with some degree of intelligence, reacting to the empty spaces on the pitch. Usually, those empty spaces are spots out wide, especially if you use an IF or IW ahead of them. Using conventional wingers ahead of them might free up your IWBs to positionally more centrally. If you use an IWB(a), you will probably see them scoring a few goals from the edge of the box. The one thing I really enjoy about IWBs is that they are rated a little more leniently by the match rating system. WBs, on the other hand, often receive dreadful ratings from missing one or two crosses and not providing assets.

Yaya Sanogo (tall, strong, and with mediocre pace) led my league in scoring two seasons in a row as the lone striker in my 4-3-3. There are a lot of headers in the game, and he was winning a ton of them, but the real key to his success was the pace and dribbling ability of my AML/AMR inside forwards. Sanogo would essentially clean up the mess from the chaos those inside forwards caused.

In FM23, I bought an outright winger regen who had incredible pace, acceleration, dribbling, crossing, flair, and agility. He wasn't great at much else, so W(a) was how I deployed him in both a 4-3-3 and 4-2-3-1. In both formations, he was really bad. In his last 73 league matches (about half of those matches were with my team), he has scored 1 goal and provided 8 assists. One goal in 73 matches!!! I couldn't believe it when an AI team wanted to pay me 20 million for him, which I felt was about 19 million too much. I had a similar player in FM22 and he was almost as bad. I figured that was mostly due to FM22 favouring more narrow formations, but now in FM23, I still don't think wingers are hugely effective. I agree that sliding them back to the ML/MR spots can help because the match ratings don't seem to punish them for not scoring goals when positioned deeper. If your AML/AMR goes a few games without scoring, it can be nearly impossible to get them out of that ratings funk.

Also, there is no clear idea of the "best" approach against certain teams and formations. If you ask this forum for a good underdog tactic against Man City, you will see a variety of suggestions and general lack of consensus. I'm not convinced that choosing between a 4-3-3 and a 4-2-3-1 or trapping inside vs. outside or playing a WB(s) vs. FB(s) is how an inferior team can get one over on a better team. Similarly, I think most of the problems posted in this tactic forum are primarily issues with handling finances, managing morale, and picking good transfers rather than any sort of tactical failure.

Yes, I posted about it a couple of pages back. There are at least twice as many headers as there should be. If you watch the match on full for a few minutes, you will see the header tennis being played.

How is it working out? I have played a ton of games with the 4-3-3 in many versions of FM, and in FM23, I've noticed far fewer crosses than ever from the wingbacks. They used to cross 10-20 times a match in older FMs, but now they might not cross a single time. When putting them on attack, they might be pushed to cross more (I think that role's default is cross more often), but I haven't noticed too much of a difference. What I have noticed is that the wingbacks will touch the ball a lot and simply recycle possession. It's a bit of a dull attack really. My wingbacks are more threatening when launching risky passes from deep early on in possession, kind of like the passes Alexander-Arnold or even Van Dijk at CD might try for Liverpool. When they're not doing that, they're going a dozen games or more without an assist. As for the F9(s), it hasn't worked for me. DLF(a) and AF(a) seemed more consistently able to contribute. Another thing that worked for me was asking my inside forwards to sit narrow in their instructions. This might just be a game-y thing since they will overload the central area, but they get much more involved in goalscoring that way. Either way, my inside forwards end up being my main playmakers, so dribbling, passing, vision, first touch, and decisions all seem to be a big bonus with those wide attackers in FM23. Another thing about the front three is that it really helps if they are good in the air. Even if you select low crosses and a possession-based system, there will be plenty of aerial challenges for your front three to win. Everyone kind of loves lobbing a pass to them instead of playing it to feet. My final note is about your midfield three. I think it's a bit conservative, though with attacking wingbacks it seems sensible. Still, because those attacking wingbacks seem more apt to pass backwards then generate serious chances, I feel it helps a lot to have an incisive midfielder such as a CM(a) providing that extra body in the box. Another idea if your attack feels stale is to experiment with the IWB(a) role. They still provide width in passing attacks, but they will find their way into scoring positions for a handful of goals each season.

I disagree. FM23 is at least as good as prior iterations. I have all prior versions and would rather play FM23. That's not to say that the game is perfect. There are countless things to criticize, but that's always been the case. The match engine has never been true to real life, with something always way out of whack (ex. too many goals from corners in FM11, too many crosses in FM21, and too many aerial challenges in FM23). If by bugs you mean things such as adjusting column widths in screens then I agree. I can't believe that I still can't customize my squad view screen without the last couple of columns disappearing. If you extend your wish for "virtually flawless" to the match engine or player behaviour then I don't think it's realistic to hope for perfection. I think those elements are too difficult to model and will always be a work in progress.

You have 6 players in the midfield and all of them are on support duty. That feels a bit lifeless to me. I would consider giving one of the AMCs and one of the wingbacks and attack duty. You might also find some excitement out of using a SV(a). Another idea is to give your striker a support role (ex. DLF(s)) and use shadow strikers behind him.